Take the Shot
by Elven Ink
Summary: **COMPLETE** Hallowe'en AU. Rhys and Vaughn are Hyperion hunters, the biggest hunter corporation in the universe. They slay and exorcise the supernatural beings of the night. But Rhys has a secret, one that could turn him from a hunter to a target — he's being haunted by a ghost of his own. But at least the ghost helps him out on hunts…sometimes.


**AN: I wrote this in like…two hours. It's just a drabble, so enjoy it as the silly wee thing that it is and please don't expect Homer's_ Odyssey_-levels of sense/plot/pacing. This was written purely for funsies. **

* * *

When the world went crazy, most people chose to hide. But some people saw what they always saw: a problem that they could offer a solution to. For money, of course.

They marketed it as 'heroism'.

To Rhys, it made sense. Sure it _felt _kind of unheroic to demand money in exchange for saving someone from an infestation of furious pixies, or to leave a family cowering in their own home because they couldn't afford a Hyperion Silver Rank Hunter to take out the werewolf that was prowling outside. But it made sense.

Sort of.

Silver bullets were expensive. They didn't live in a dream world, Vasquez reminded them during yet another training video. If silver bullets were free, they'd be able to save everyone. But they weren't. They cost money. So Hyperion was doing the right thing, the _only_ thing they could do. Hyperion were heroes — slaying vampires, exorcising ghosts, and banishing demons. Hyperion kept the dark creatures of Pandora at bay.

For the people who could afford it.

"I can't believe they're sending a couple of Irons for this hunt."

Rhys finished buckling his dagger to his boot and looked over at Vaughn, who was complaining as he checked his equipment for a third time. "Did you _hear _what Yvette said? They found _claw marks_. Zombies don't leave _claw marks_, Rhys. I'm telling you, we're gonna get down there and it's gonna be a Silver Grade."

"Well, if it is, we'll just get out of there. Way over our pay grade," Rhys assured him. He and Vaughn were still only Iron Rank Hunters after all. Anything over a shambling zombie or maybe a selkie was technically out of their league. Then again, with Rhys' track record of late, he _was _due a promotion soon. He'd already had a few run-ins whereby a hunt had quickly escalated from an Iron Grade monster to a Steel Grade. He was pretty confident that Vasquez would have to notice his victories soon and promote him to a Steel Rank Hunter.

Then it was just a case of surviving and getting up to Silver Rank and he would be living the life he'd always dreamed. Silver Rank Hunters were basically celebrities on Pandora after all, and better yet, their hunts were few and far between. Lots of time off, but lots of pay — because the hunts they did get were pretty lethal. Werewolves, vampires, poltergeists, all the stuff that Rhys had nightmares about. But hey, loads of money and holiday time!

Plus, he was never alone on his hunts. And he didn't just mean his designated partner…

"Damn right," Vaughn said, closing his pack after counting his guns for the fourth time. "Like, they can't fire us if we bail 'cause it's not an Iron Grade monster, right? 'Cause the higher ups have been putting so much pressure on lately. I swear, Vasquez _knows _the clients are paying for Iron Hunters just so they don't have to pay Steel Hunter rates. He totally knows, and he sends us anyway."

"So we'll take their money and if it's a Steel job, we'll tell the client they need to pay the difference and hire a rank up," Rhys said, knowing damn well he'd never be able to do that. He'd probably try and tackle the hunt anyway. Vaughn knew it, he knew it, and the other guy knew it too.

"Or Vasquez'll tell us to do it anyway. Did you hear what happened to Shaun? They kept sending him on Steel Rank jobs, and he got so desperate he _made a pact with a demon to help him_ _out_. That's why he was coming back without a scratch! The Silvers got suspicious, investigated, and found a summon mark on his shoulder. They...they _banished _him."

Banishing a demon was, for want of a better description, a bloody mess. Hyperion claimed there was a 50-50 chance the summoner of said demon would survive (which was better than those hacks at Atlas, they only offered a 70-30 chance, they told the clients). In truth, Rhys had never heard of a banishing ritual completing without the summoner being turned into a bloody pile of flesh. Demons...demons had claws. And they hooked in deep to their summoners. They didn't like to let go.

He shuddered at the thought.

"He shoulda known better than to summon a demon. It's _literally _our job to hunt those things. What was he thinking?" Rhys laughed nervously, wondering if the same eyes that had been on Shaun were now on him.

In Rhys' defence, he hadn't deliberately summoned his supernatural assistant.

It had been a complete accident.

Rhys gave a sidewards glance to the presence in the room that Vaughn was blind to. Floating off to Rhys' left side was a greyish-blue figure, dressed in Hyperion hunter garb above that of even a Silver Rank. Arms folded, the ghostly figure smirked over to Rhys.

"Y'know, exorcisms are a messy business too!" The ghost chirped. "I had to do a few in my time. It's kinda the same deal as a demon banishing, only ghosts don't cling to flesh like demons do. They cling to your soul. See, that's the difference between a summoning and a haunting. Summoning's all physical, but a haunting is all spiritual. Betcha wish I was a demon now, right pumpkin?"

Rhys could feel his face burning red, but he couldn't reply to his ghostly companion. Sure, he only had himself to blame. At the time, snooping around the locked office of the late CEO of Hyperion had seemed like a good idea. Handsome Jack, the revered leader of Hyperion, had died on a hunt. His efforts were legendary, and if the CEO went off on a hunt himself, you knew it was serious business. But the day the solemn news went around that Handsome Jack had been murdered?

That...had seemed so impossible. For everyone at Hyperion, Handsome Jack had been elevated to the point it seemed laughable that he was just a man. The idea that he was dead just seemed ludicrous. But while most of Hyperion reeled in shock, one man had taken the reins while no one was looking. Vasquez had slipped into the role of CEO before anyone had come back to their senses properly, and by the time they had, he'd established himself as the next Handsome Jack.

Things had gone downhill from there. The new CEO was quite happy to send Iron ranks out on Steel Rank jobs. After all, not many people on Pandora could afford a Steel Rank, so would often just suffer. But in Vasquez's eyes, these people were an untapped market. Take what little they did have and send the lowest rank hunter, so what if the target was way out of their league? Paying Iron Rank fees for a Steel Rank job was still more profit for Hyperion than missing the job altogether because of something as pesky as "I couldn't afford it".

So, in frustration, Rhys had snuck into the locked office of the late Handsome Jack to try and find something, anything to usurp Vasquez. He wasn't sure what he had been expecting to find. But the spirit of the late CEO, trapped in his old gun? Yeah, he shouldn't have picked it up. If he hadn't, the ghost of Handsome Jack wouldn't have been able to get a hold of him and haunt him.

There were pros and cons of this arrangement. The pros were, admittedly, pretty sweet. For one, it was Handsome freaking Jack. He was the best hunter ever to rise from Hyperion, and he knew a hell of a lot about various marks and monsters. When he wanted to cooperate, he was a valuable source of learning for Rhys. Two, Jack's spirit was a poltergeist, meaning he could interact with the physical world to some degree. If Rhys was about to miss a target in training? A little shove and the target would move a little, and boom! Bullseye, top marks for Rhysie! Sometimes, Rhys would even let Jack completely possess him and take control of his body to perform some complicated manoeuvrer in order to take down a monster way beyond an Iron's capabilities.

The cons? Jack had quickly discovered Rhys' office was plastered in posters of, well, Jack. He had been insufferable about it for the last few months. Rhys was certain Jack had even started putting up more posters too; at the very least, that calendar hadn't been there before...

On top of that, the ghost seemed utterly in denial as to his current state of being. Sure, Jack knew he was a ghost. But he was adamant that he wasn't dead. According to Jack, he'd just been "displaced" from his body, and he needed to find it again. As such, the spirit frequently badgered Rhys about going on a mission to find his body, often threatening to possess Rhys if he didn't.

Plus, there was the whole "technically I am the sort of target Hyperion hunts and purges" thing. If anyone found out Rhys was haunted, well…

A messy exorcism was on the cards. He'd be heading a similar way to poor old Shaun.

"Look, I know you can't talk to me when Abs McGee is around, but er, you wanna at least _wink _or something? I hate being ignored. Honestly, pet hate of mine," Jack complained, floating around Rhys. "Don't make me start slamming cupboard doors or rattling door handles. Although, last time, it was pretty funny seeing Vaughn wet himself when the lockers all starting rattling like, what kinda hunter is scared of ghosts?" He started laughing, stumbling over his own words to make room for his chuckles.

"C'mon, let's just...go check it out," Rhys ground out, partly directed at Vaughn, partly at Jack. He couldn't get the image of a damn exorcism out of his head now, and honestly, a hunt was now a pretty appealing way of taking his mind off things. Iron Rank or not.

* * *

They were sent down to Pandora with a basic Iron Hunter kit. But, once they arrived at the client's house, Rhys discovered that Vaughn's fears were definitely not unfounded. Running his hands along the walls, Rhys' fingers found the deep groves of claw-marks that signified this hunt definitely needed more than a basic Iron Hunter's kit.

The only saving grace was that the claw marks were spaced around the same as Rhys' own fingers, so it wasn't bigger than he was at least. Hunters learned many ways to identify a target before seeing the beast itself. Ectoplasm signified a ghost's interaction with the physical world, for example. A werewolf's human form sported heterochromia, (though that wasn't to say all people with the condition were werewolves. Merely that all werewolves had it. That was the tricky part until a full moon came around and told you who was who). Claw marks spaced to human-sized fingers? That was a classic sign of a vampire attack.

"Yup. Right. Definitely Steel Rank? We can go?" Vaughn asked, peering closer to the claw marks too. "That's definitely a vampire, bro. And the man of the house said his wife went missing. Classic vampire behaviour; it's taken his wife to feed on. We _cannot _fight a blood-fed vampire."

"...right..." Rhys mumbled, but he could see Vaughn turn and narrow his eyes at him.

"No, c'mon, I know that face, that tone of voice, that slightly-distracted look. Rhys we _can't_."

"No no, I get it. I'll...pack stuff up and you can go tell 'em."

"...What?"

"Yeah, go tell him he needs to cough up for a Steel Rank," Rhys said calmly, starting to move away from the wall. "I'll pack our kit back up and you can go tell the guy he needs to pay up and we'll send Steel Rank Hunters."

Vaughn paused, looking between the claw marks, Rhys, and the rest of the room they were in. It was pretty standard home décor for Pandora, in that it was sparse and poor at best. Any money this guy had, Hyperion already took it.

"I...don't think he can..."

"Shame. Guess the vamp's coming back tonight to pick him off. Or maybe his son."

"...This? This right here? This is literally what's gonna kill me," Vaughn snapped, but he pulled out his handgun all the same, checking that the gun was loaded. "You got silver bullets?"

Rhys stopped, looked over his shoulder, and smirked.

"Stole 'em from the Silver cache on the way down. You too?"

"...Yeah, well, I wasn't...you know, it might be just a fledgling vampire, figured we might...could probably just deal with it, y'know?" Vaughn shrugged, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. "Brought them just in case you wanted to play at Handsome Jack again and be the hero. And get us both killed."

"Awww, he's cute," Jack cooed, the ghost flickering into existence next to Rhys. "He thinks you're like me. That's adorable. What a bro. What a guy. What a wingman. What a—"

A crash and a screech erupted from Rhys' right, making all three men jump and yell in unison. Thundering out from the room adjacent to them, a whirl of claws and fangs lunged at Rhys, hissing and spitting. To Vaughn, it looked like Rhys leapt to the side at the last second. To Rhys, he felt the collar of his shirt being yanked forcefully to the side, causing him to stumble out of the way just in time.

"Holy _crap_, it was still here the whole time?!" Vaughn yelped, pointing his handgun at the vampire with a quivering hand. The creature rounded on the pair again and nearly jolted forward to strike once more, but two rapidly-fired bullets sent the vampire recoiling back. The bullets whistled past, missing their mark but at least buying them some time from its next strike.

"Rhys, run!"

Rhys didn't need telling twice. He scrambled backwards away from the monster, managing to unholster his own firearm and train it on the creature.

"You need to get it between the eyes, cupcake, or it'll just keep getting back up," Jack said, pointing over at the vampire. "Wait till it straightens up and bam! Right in the head!"

Sure, the vampire did straighten up. But it offered only a glance towards Rhys and Vaughn, its expression suddenly fearful, before it turned on its heel and ran towards the door. Jack shrugged.

"Or, y'know, it might go for the targets that _don't _have guns. Guess that's smart."

Rhys' heart dropped to his feet, a cold wave smashing into him.

"Vaughn, it's going for the client!"

With that, Rhys set off at a run, chasing after the vampire. It crashed through door into the hallway, through into the kitchen, heading for the main living room door.

_I'm not gonna get there in time! I'm not gonna — _

Before his eyes, the door to the living room slammed closed just as the vampire was about to rush through it. The door smashed into the creature with such force that it was sent sprawling backwards, knocked clean out cold.

Jack's translucent form bled through the open door, face split with a grin.

"You're welcome, pumpkin."

Rhys skidded to a halt, hands on his thighs as he doubled over and dragged air into his lungs.

"You...coulda done that...two rooms ago..."

"I mean, I could have, yeah. But watching you running? Such a treat, I mean, you look like a gazelle snorted half a pound of coke, it's crazy, s'all just _legs_ all over the place."

Rhys rolled his eyes, training his gun on the fallen vampire. It almost seemed unfair to shoot it when it was down, but he knew the vampire certainly wouldn't have offered such mercy. Plus, an Iron Rank taking down a vampire? This was a promotion-shot job for sure.

His index finger tightened on the trigger, about to fire the lethal shot to the mark, when a commotion behind him brought his attention whirling back to the room he'd just bolted from.

"_Rhhhyyyss!_"

Vaughn's yell was accented by a snarl, and Rhys' blood ran cold — _two _vampires?!

They should have packed up and left when they had the chance. This was way, _way _over their heads.

"T-tell me if he gets up!" Rhys bleated to Jack, before setting off at a run back to Vaughn.

"Hey, no, wait! That's not a vam— !"

Rhys was gone before Jack could finish his sentence. He darted back through the hallway into the side room in time to see Vaughn's body being flung across it.

"Vaughn!"

The man landed heavily against the wall, though his groan at least told Rhys he was alive. He made to move toward his partner on instinct, until a low growl pinned him in place, demanding his attention.

Frozen to the core, Rhys could only stiffly turn his head enough to lock eyes with the telltale mismatched gaze of a werewolf. One blue eye, and one scarred, blinded eye of milky-dulled green glared back at him. Slowly, Rhys looked down over its face, shaking more and more as he saw the huge teeth flashing behind a curled lip.

"Oh. Shit."

"YES! Hahahaha, I knew it!" Jack burst in through the wall above the fallen Vaughn, looking over at the werewolf with adoration in his eyes. "I knew I knew that growl from anywhere! Oh my god, _look _at me! Dayum! I am a badass werewolf, right? Just look at that glossy fur and those well-kept claws!"

For a hot second, Rhys' brain fell out of his ears. Metaphorically, for now, though the werewolf might well change that soon.

"...What," he blurted out, voice thick with confusion.

"Yeah! Keep it to yourself, Rhysie, but errr...I got into a little situation a few years ago and got a little nibbled and well, yeah. Now I'm no fun on a full moon and order my steaks blue," Jack grinned, floating over to the werewolf. Strangely, the beast's eyes followed Jack, as though it could see the spirit too. "Help me get back into my body and I'll stop trying to claw your face of."

"How did—but you're—Hyperion hunters—werewolf? How'd you—" Rhys bumbled through several questions he wanted to ask all at once.

"It's like you don't hang on to every word I say as gospel truth, Rhys, and frankly, that hurts my heart. I told you! I got knocked outta my body! Lotta rivals, buddy, and my last hunt was a fricking set-up. Got smacked right outta my body and now some loser is using me like a war dog. Look, just...help me figure out how I get back in and we'll go get me some sweet, sweet revenge!" Jack said, shoulder-barging into the confused-looking werewolf and only managing to phase right through the beast to the other side of it. "Damn. Thought that would work. Looks so easy in video games."

"J-j-just keep...keep him...you...distracted on...you..." Rhys stammered out, stepping very slowly towards the werewolf with his hands out in front, as though they wouldn't be cut through like butter if the wolf decided to eat him. "...and er...maybe we can..."

Pain.

Pain burst in Rhys' neck so suddenly, so violently, that he almost passed out there and then. Rooted to the spot, his eyes widened in shock as all the warmth of his body seemed to pool at the side of his throat, leaving his whole self chilled to the bone. His arms dropped like lead at his sides, his mind draining down and down. He was vaguely aware of Jack turning to face him, face slackening in horror.

"_**Rhys!**_"

The last thing Rhys thought before the vampire let him fall unceremoniously to the ground was one of self-reprimand.

_I knew I should have taken the shot._


End file.
